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Whether your getting ready for a summer vacation away from home or a weekend trip close to home, you plan all the things your going to need for the trip. For instance, a week at the beach house, you might bring bathing suits, towels, sun block, and something for the sunburns, just in case one gets too much sun. And of course you will want to bring a camera to capture those moments.

What story do you want to tell with your photographs? What is unique about this summer trip? By taking some time to plan your photographic story, you will end up with more photographs with the “wow” factor and really capture the spirit of your summer trip.

To tell any good story, its needs four elements. Plot. Character. Setting. Details. This holds true for photography as well. Here is how you can incorporate story telling while taking photographs.

Plot – What action is taking place? Is there a tension or conflict in the story? What is important to the story? Perhaps this summer trip is a family reunion. Or the first trip for a toddler.

Character – What is unique about the person you are photographing? I know I have an uncle who loves to entertain the kids at Christmas in-between opening presents.

Setting – What is important about your surroundings? What is unique? I know someone who traveled abroad and they had an outdoor shower with an amazing view. Her husband took a wonderful photograph of her using the shower and the view just beyond.

Details – What are the little details that help tell the story? Like the bucket the children used to build a sand castle on the beach. You could compose a photograph of the discarded bucket by the sand castle with the children playing on the beach in the distance.

Once you have arrived at your summer destination, here are some tips for capturing your summer story in pictures.

Leave the camera behind. If you’re going to be there for a week, leave the camera behind for the first two days. Spend this time just enjoying the atmosphere with your family. If you do this, once you do whip out your camera, your family will probably be more cooperative with you taking pictures and may be less prone to whining about you being behind the camera all the time.

With your camera packed away, take the time to make some observations about your surroundings. This will help you plan out your shots when you do have your camera in hand.

Choose the day, time and location for your photographs carefully. Take the photograph we mentioned earlier of the bucket the children used to build the sand castle. This photograph will have more “wow” factor at sunset with less people on the beach versus the middle of the afternoon when the sun is high and there are a lot of people on the beach.

Be prepared to come back when the timing is right for that perfect photograph.

Here’s one story I have captured this summer. I have digitally scrapped this story and it was easy to do since I knew ahead of time what I wanted to photograph.

Scrap pages were created at Scrapblog.com

You can have better photographs by thinking about the photograph you want to capture ahead of time. And don’t forget to get yourself in the photograph. These techniques can also be used for capturing those photographs for Summer Stock Sunday hosted by Robin over at Around the Island. Click on over to see more photographs on this Summer Stock Sunday.

Do you have past summer vacations on video, why not have them transferred over to DVD.